Yeah the topic of safety tools eroding trust is a complex topic I didn't even want to try to touch in that long ramble I did.
I'm a big fan of them when used well, I've been playing long enough to have seen X cards go from the worst tool I've seen to okay over the years as the idea was refined.
But at the end of the day I still advocate for Red Green Yellow systems taken from the Kink community and if I'm worried about it I place colored index cards.
This isn't a solution as usual you still have to have some two way communication which can be tricky to do well.
Also I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who is like metric, imperial, whatever best fits the need of the moment.
I loathed reading Shakespeare in school. They're plays. (Well, the sonnets aren't, but we never did those in school.) Plays are intended to be performed. I'd rather go to a theatre or watch a movie than read Shakespeare.
To me, reading the script of a play is like someone giving me the score to Beethoven's Ninth or Mozart's Requiem or the guitar tabs to Hendrix's Purple Haze or the Benesh notation for Swan Lake and expecting me to be enthused. The notes on the page aren't what matters: they're just a starting point. The performance and interpretation is what matters - and that includes the things that aren't on the page: costumes, lighting, choreography, facial expression, tone, and so on.
Oh - and I also skip all the songs in LotR, and pretty much every other book!
You put your finger on why I don't like *some* of Wordsworth's output, Christian! How do you find the work of John Clare in comparison? To me, he captures the reality of rural poverty far better. I remember sitting with their collected works and finding similar poems on 'gypsies' (as they were called) and you can tell who has actually sat and broken bread with travelling people and who is imagining them from a middle class point of view...
Very much enjoyed the section about metric vs imperial system!
I’m showing my bias for the metric system here, as we solely use metric system in Belgium. But for me the biggest upside of metric system is the ease of conversion between magnitudes of lengths mm->cm->m->km, while in metrics this seems rather arbitrary chosen (1760 yards in a mile I think?).
That being said, totally agree that the unit measurement (meter) is totally arbitrary (and apparently not even well-defined :) ) and that a base 12 counting system would haven been the better choice for everyday math!
I'm not sure if you're referring to me about the poetry part; I did say I have no interest in it. BUT I am mulling over how I can find and read some poetry that I'll have a good chance of enjoying. I'm sure my library has some collections I can check out. And someone recommended a Youtube channel to me that talks about how to read poetry.
I've seen Branagh's and Tom Hiddleston's performances of the Crispin speech and Branagh's is much better, though I'm no Shakespeare expert.
I was intentionally vague on the not liking poetry bit because it's something that my students talk about too when they read things like The Federalist Papers etc. It was your Note that spurred the thought, but I didn't want it to seem like I was calling anyone out because that's not what I was doing at all.
Thanks for the shout out! I hope you see “Hamnet.” I’m now thinking of downloading “Frankenstein” for upcoming plane travel thanks to your mention. Been super curious about it even if horror isn’t quite my thing
Thanks for the mention, Christian!
Yeah the topic of safety tools eroding trust is a complex topic I didn't even want to try to touch in that long ramble I did.
I'm a big fan of them when used well, I've been playing long enough to have seen X cards go from the worst tool I've seen to okay over the years as the idea was refined.
But at the end of the day I still advocate for Red Green Yellow systems taken from the Kink community and if I'm worried about it I place colored index cards.
This isn't a solution as usual you still have to have some two way communication which can be tricky to do well.
Also I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who is like metric, imperial, whatever best fits the need of the moment.
I loathed reading Shakespeare in school. They're plays. (Well, the sonnets aren't, but we never did those in school.) Plays are intended to be performed. I'd rather go to a theatre or watch a movie than read Shakespeare.
To me, reading the script of a play is like someone giving me the score to Beethoven's Ninth or Mozart's Requiem or the guitar tabs to Hendrix's Purple Haze or the Benesh notation for Swan Lake and expecting me to be enthused. The notes on the page aren't what matters: they're just a starting point. The performance and interpretation is what matters - and that includes the things that aren't on the page: costumes, lighting, choreography, facial expression, tone, and so on.
Oh - and I also skip all the songs in LotR, and pretty much every other book!
You put your finger on why I don't like *some* of Wordsworth's output, Christian! How do you find the work of John Clare in comparison? To me, he captures the reality of rural poverty far better. I remember sitting with their collected works and finding similar poems on 'gypsies' (as they were called) and you can tell who has actually sat and broken bread with travelling people and who is imagining them from a middle class point of view...
Very much enjoyed the section about metric vs imperial system!
I’m showing my bias for the metric system here, as we solely use metric system in Belgium. But for me the biggest upside of metric system is the ease of conversion between magnitudes of lengths mm->cm->m->km, while in metrics this seems rather arbitrary chosen (1760 yards in a mile I think?).
That being said, totally agree that the unit measurement (meter) is totally arbitrary (and apparently not even well-defined :) ) and that a base 12 counting system would haven been the better choice for everyday math!
I'm not sure if you're referring to me about the poetry part; I did say I have no interest in it. BUT I am mulling over how I can find and read some poetry that I'll have a good chance of enjoying. I'm sure my library has some collections I can check out. And someone recommended a Youtube channel to me that talks about how to read poetry.
I've seen Branagh's and Tom Hiddleston's performances of the Crispin speech and Branagh's is much better, though I'm no Shakespeare expert.
Thanks for sharing my post!
I was intentionally vague on the not liking poetry bit because it's something that my students talk about too when they read things like The Federalist Papers etc. It was your Note that spurred the thought, but I didn't want it to seem like I was calling anyone out because that's not what I was doing at all.
I really enjoy your thoughts on films and books.
I don’t mind being called out. It’ll force me to better explain myself and/or try new things, and those are both okay with me.
Thanks for the shout out! I hope you see “Hamnet.” I’m now thinking of downloading “Frankenstein” for upcoming plane travel thanks to your mention. Been super curious about it even if horror isn’t quite my thing